Sweet Captivity

"Who are you?"

Big, green eyes stared at the white-haired boy sitting on the window. Her window. "How did you get here? Why are you here?" Tiny hands grabbed the nearest thing in the vicinity, a frying pan. It was intended for offense and defense.

The said boy grinned. "Relax. I'm Jack Frost. Nice to meet you." Jack jumped from the window and into the room. He swung his staff around as he inched closer to the girl. "How old are you? I'm 17."

She raised her frying pan to try and scare him off. Although it was no match for the staff he was holding. "You haven't answered my questions yet."

Jack smirked. "Yes, I have. I told you my name."

"Jerk," she muttered.

"I heard that." He looked around the room. He had been wondering about this place for a long time. "What are you doing here all alone? Don't you want to go outside?"

"I'm not alone. And I… I can't."

He looked at her weirdly. "You are alone, Rapunzel."

"How do you know my name?"

Jack walked to Rapunzel's bed and lay down comfortably. He placed his staff beside him. "I've observed you for quite some time now. A woman comes here once in a while and screams, 'Oh, Rapunzel. Let down you hair,'" he said, attempting to copy the voice of the woman. "But other than her, no one else visits you."

What he said didn't offend her. She knew it was true. Oddly, she couldn't help but smile. His smile was contagious. "You're the first one aside from her. And that woman is actually my mother."

"Really?" he asked. His brows rose. "I don't see any resemblance."

"What do you mean?" The smile was wiped off her face. She was confused.

Jack sighed. "Will you stop asking me questions? And what I mean is, you don't look alike at all. Besides, if she's really your mother, why does she keep you locked up in this tower? Why can't you go outside?"

Rapunzel pulled a chair and placed it next to the bed. Next to Jack. She sat down, but she still held the pan firmly. "It's for my own good. She told me that the people outside are dangerous."

"Do I look dangerous?" he asked her expectantly. His mood changed quite quickly.

"No. I wouldn't be sitting next to you if you were, would I?" She rolled her eyes.

His shoulders sagged. He thought being dangerous was fun. But he noticed her hands that clasped the frying pan. "But you're still holding that pan! That means you're a bit scared of me, right? Right?"

She laughed. He was pretty funny. She was actually enjoying herself. "Alright, maybe you are, but just a bit. And I have to take precautions. The outside world is dangerous. The people will just use me and… my gift."

Jack cocked his head. "What gift? Your one hundred feet of golden hair?"

"Seventy feet, not a hundred. Not yet, anyway." She unconsciously dropped the pan as she pulled her hair close to her. The pan made no sound when it fell for it landed on her hair.

"So it is the hair? What does it do?" Jack sat up, suddenly interested.

Rapunzel's already wide eyes widened. Her mother explicitly told her not to trust anyone except for her. That meant she wasn't allowed to tell anyone about her gift.

"Come on. Tell me."

She bit her lip and held her hair tighter.

Jack sensed her hesitation. He suddenly got an idea and stood up on her bed. "Alright. I'll show you something." He grabbed his staff and channeled his power. He called the wind and flew.

He circled Rapunzel, who was looking at him in amazement. He then flew around the room and observed the paintings on the walls. He looked at them then at Rapunzel and back at the paintings in awe. "You made these?"

"You can fly?"

They looked at each other. Green and blue met. Something within them spurred as they held each other's eyes captive.

Rapunzel felt her heart beat faster and her cheeks flush. She raised a hand to cup her heated cheek as a shy smile involuntarily graced her face. She heard something ring.

Jack felt his body heat up for the first time in centuries. His heart thumped loudly and he brought a hand over it to calm it. He also heard a bell ring when he looked straight into her eyes.

"Did you hear that?" he whispered.

"The bell?" she asked.

"Yes." He flew back down on the bed. "I thought I was the only one who heard it."

"I don't have a bell in my room," Rapunzel said. "But I read in a book…"

Jack looked at her, urging her to continue. "What did you read?"

She gathered her courage and looked into his eyes again. His beautiful eyes which were pools of blue. "When you hear the bell, it means the person you're with is the one."

He averted his gaze. Rapunzel's emeralds were like magnets. He wanted to lean in and do something. He didn't know what, but he wanted to. "I don't understand."

She bit her lip. She didn't understand how she knew more about that than him when she had never stepped foot outside the tower. "It means you're in love," she blurted out.

Jack's eyes widened and he looked at Rapunzel in the eyes. He meant to ask her to explain more, but he made the mistake of meeting her eyes. Unable to control himself, he leaned in and captured her lips. His body rose from the bed.

Rapunzel's eyes fluttered close. Her cheeks reddened even more. And her golden hair glowed.

He ended the sweet captivity of her lips and his body slowly alighted on the bed. He noticed her hair.

She opened her eyes. Her face gradually returned to its original color and her hair stopped glowing.

"Your hair glowed," he said.

"You kissed me!" she said, stunned but not accusatory.

Jack blinked a few times and gulped. He didn't know what came over him. "I… I…" He didn't know what to say either.

So he left the bed and went to the window. He leapt out. He flew away from her.

She ran after him and shouted, "Wait!" But she was too late. She looked outside her window and saw him flying away. "Jack," she whispered.

She sighed. She went to her vanity table where Pascal was sleeping, seemingly undisturbed by the ruckus. She grabbed her brush and brushed her long hair. As she did so, she wondered why her hair glowed when he kissed her. "That was my first kiss too," she said out aloud. "And I wasn't even able to tell you about my gift."

She suddenly spied Jack's staff lying on her bed. A smile crept up her face as she realized, "This staff seems important to him. He'll probably come back to retrieve it. I'll get to see him again."

She put down her brush and spun around the room, laughing jovially and uncontrollably. She hugged herself and said, "I think… I think I'm in love."

Jack grabbed his hair and groaned. He was sitting on top of a tree. Rapunzel's tower was still in his view. "Punk, why the hell did you that?"

He sighed and leaned on the tree. "She's so beautiful and she's so smart, but she's still so innocent."

He smiled. "Her name sounds beautiful too. It suits her well. Rapunzel." He snorted. "It's too long. I'll just call her Punzie from now on."

He placed a hand on his left chest-his heart. "Am I… Am I in love?"

He then shook his head. "That's ridiculous." He reached for his staff, but his hand only met the air. He realized that left it in her tower. His smile grew wider. "That means I have a reason to come back. I'll get to see her again."